Plan Commission - Regular Meeting

Good evening and welcome to the June 16th, 2026 meeting of the Carmel Plan Commission. Will you please join us for the Pledge of Allegiance? Thank you very much. Mr. Secretary, will you please call the roll?

Jess Lawhead. Jonathan Blake. Adam Campagna. Present. Jeff Hill. Present. Christine Zicola.

Present.

Sue Westermeyer.

Present.

Debbie Buckler. Present. Mark Adair. Present. Teresa Ayers.

Thank you, Brick. We have a quorum. Next up on our agenda is approval of our May. Planning Commission meeting minutes. Do I have a motion to approve?

So approved.

A motion to have a second? Second. Thank you for the motion and the second. All those in favor of approving the May minutes, please say aye.

Aye.

They are approved, thank you very much. Up next is communications bills, expenditures, and legal council report. And I see that we've got the sub area plan, so I will turn it over to Adrian.

I don't know. Try plugging this in again. Oh, that's not good.

Maybe.

Do you want to try a different way? Or Hal, is there something that we can do?

Yeah, I don't know. It seems to be only when I plug in this. I'm keeping it away from the mic.

Oh, I don't think it's. Oh, it's because I.

Maybe? Yeah. I don't know what's going on. I apologize for the technology in this room. OK. OK. Yeah. OK. So good evening. My name is Adrienne Keeling with the Department of Community Services. I am back here with the home place sub area plan. It was an amended version was approved by the city council at their May 18th meeting. And the protocol for when the city council amends a comprehensive plan proposal is that the Plan Commission will then have 60 days to approve, disapprove, or take no action on their amendments. We're a little familiar with this based on the discussion we had last month with the US 31 sub area plan having been amended. So this is the same drill for the home place sub area plan. However, the good news is the amendments to the home place sub-area plan were far less extensive than the council's amendments to the US 31 sub-area plan. So I'll get into those briefly. The first one you'll recognize because it also affected the US 31 sub-area plan in that the boundaries were amended. took these two areas. This one's along Pennsylvania. And this is along I-465 east of College. Those were previously listed in the US 31 subarea boundary. And because of the residential nature of both of those areas, we talked about moving those into the home place subarea boundary. So this is the corresponding amendment that That was made to the US 31 sub area plan boundary to add these to the homeplace boundary and you'll find those this map Calls out those specific areas, but you'll find that that boundary has changed in a couple of other places throughout the document The second change has has to do with the the mention of tax increment financing and IN THE DOCUMENT, THERE ARE TWO PLACES HERE. THE COUNCIL, WE STRUCK THE MENTION OF CREATION OF TAX INCREMENT FINANCING DISTRICTS IN THE BUSINESS CORE AND AT THE FORMER ORCHARD PARK SITE. SO THIS DOESN'T NECESSARILY PRECLUDE THE POSSIBILITY OF TAX INCREMENT FINANCING BEING USED IN THE HOME PLACE AREA. We just did not specifically call it out. The intent is that a full range of options and financial tools should be considered. So that sentence was struck on page 15, and on page 19, similarly, there was under the policy guidance section, there was a section that called out the potential for home place tax increment financing districts. That was stricken, and we added under the explore new funding support programs, we added a bullet point to say consider a full range of financial tools to support future home place investments. And that was the extent of the revisions that were made at the council level. So for this evening, again, your options are to approve, disapprove, and make other recommended changes, or to take no action within 60 days. That 60 days will be up on July 17th, so if there is more discussion, there is time to have that discussion at the July 7th committee meeting. However, if there's no further discussion, we recommend approving the amendments this evening, and then the document will go into effect as adopted.

Thank you. Great, thank you very much. So very small changes. Do I have any commentary questions from up here? Counselors, do you want to add anything? Or Adrienne pretty much covered it.

Yes, Adrienne, thank you so much.

I have no comments. Any questions or a motion?

Move that we approve.

Thank you for the motion. Second, all those in favor of approving the amended sub-area plan for home place, please say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed? Hearing none, it is approved. Adrian, I want to give you and DOCS staff a great deal of thanks that this was such, you spent a year in advance, you know, working on this before we even got to the plan commission and then all the residents who showed up during the plan commission process. Contributed and all the work up here at the City Council. So this you know, really well done.

So thank you so much Thank you and that the work is in some ways just beginning so we're you know We'll still be communicating and and working working with our friends in the homeplace area.

Well, thank you Sergey we're still on legal counsel report. Is there anything else? Okay, then I will turn it over to Alexia for reports announcements and department concerns

Thank you. The outcome of our last committee meeting was on June 2, and we heard the Stella House books and cafe rebuild that was discussed and returned to the Planning Commission this evening for some further discussion. And then we also heard the US 31 sub area plan, comp plan amendment, and that was returned to the council with some suggested changes. I have no other updates or amendments to the agenda this evening. Thank you.

Thank you very much. So this now brings us to our public hearing portion of our meeting. We have one public hearing this evening. After that, we have one old business. So our public hearing this evening is docket number PZ-2026-00066, Primary Platte, Development Platte, 27 Towns Subdivision, and docket number PZ-2026-00066. dash 0067, this is ADLS, 27 towns, ADLS. The applicant seeks primary development plan and design approval for a new townhome subdivision. The site is located at 220 West 106th Street, and it is zoned Illinois Street Townhomes, PUD, Z-703-26, and it's filed by Brandon Burke with HWC Engineering on behalf of Pulte Homes of Indiana. So I will turn it over to the petitioner.

Good evening. For the record, Rex Ramage, Pulte Homes, 11595 North Meridian Street. Here before you for the petition item that you just referenced. I won't reread all that. I'm going to go through a few quick slides here. I have a couple updates as well based on some comments that were in the staff report, just some ancillary information, and then we'll take it from there. For those that may or may not recall, we were before you a few months ago and had received final zoning approval for 27 townhomes at this site, located generally at the northeast corner of 106th and Illinois Street. The site plan is largely unchanged from what the council ultimately approved, which was what you guys had seen prior thereto. So 27 units across five buildings, a single cul-de-sac, as you see depicted on the site plan. Black and white version. There is a colored version as well that shows some of the tree preservation areas that were a big topic of conversation. And then some additional plantings that are along that shared north property line with the Forte building. Architecture, again, unchanged. This was the rendering that we had showed during the rezoning process. Here again to just continue to check the box through these approvals. So we have the renderings. And then the two dimensional black and whites as well. And then we have some with dimension lines as well as that's part of this ADLS process. Again, we'll have multiple materials, multiple colors for the entire building. Here's a page that kind of shows the breakout of the various colors, the various brick and stone options and the colors that come with that. Here were some, let's call them handwritten dimensions based on the plans that we needed to submit a few weeks ago this have since been updated and submitted to staff but that was one item that was called out in the staff report so we now have the traditional prints 2d prints that are black and white with the full dimensions here that you see that we would submit for permit that's an item that had staff had flagged in the staff report I believe ADLS landscaping plan again that's been submitted and we will continue to work with staff to there's the extent there's any changes or anything that comes with that but believe we're compliant in that regard lighting obviously we'll have some lighting that comes through the development most of which will be street lamps down the street and then of course the buildings will have lighting as well signage was another item that had come up here is the general design of the sign typical column kind of with a hanging sign there. One of the items that came up in the staff report was the location of said sign. So there was a question whether or not that it was located appropriately, which was a distance of five feet from the right-of-way, which is a requirement in the city's underlying code. We did not change that as part of the PUD that was approved. So just a dimension site plan here that does show that specifically that was something else that had come out in the staff review process as well. So there's that. One other item that had come up during the staff report that is not included in the original presentation was regarding bicycle parking. So that was something that was specifically modified in the PUD ordinance. Here's a copy of that language. It basically says bicycle parking spaces shall be installed as shown on exhibit G. That'll be substantially and similar to the image and the design on exhibit G. Here's Exhibit G as it was approved in the PUD ordinance. With townhomes, there's not a ton of space along the way with the driveways and the separation of the buildings to spread these out. So we have grouped the required nine bicycle parking spaces here at this location on the south side of the boulevard that is adjacent to some guest parking spaces and some other open areas. that that was the best location for them which is something that we had pre-planned through the zoning process and was approved here's the exhibit staff had made a comment about trying to spread them out our plan is to maintain compliance with the pud and comply with this exhibit that you have here on the screen so with that we're happy to answer any questions that you all may have i know the staff report suggests that perhaps we should go to a committee meeting With those three items being relatively small, when the documentation that we have here tonight that has been submitted to staff as well would potentially request your approval this evening so we don't continue to clog your agenda as we go to the committee meeting.

Thank you. Thank you very much. This is a public hearing. Is there anybody here who would like to speak in favor or in opposition of this petition? All right, seeing none, I will turn this over to Alexia for the department report. Thank you.

Thank you. For the record, Alexia Lopez with Department of Community Services. So this is a primary plot and a development plan we're hearing tonight for 27 townhomes. You all had just reviewed recently the planned unit development for the project. There will be about 1.87 acres of open space or common area, which is about 42% of the site. The stormwater drainage will be accommodated by a dry pond. as shown on the concept plan with a PUD. Four parking spaces per dwelling are provided, plus 10 off-street spaces. Bicycle parking spaces are shown. However, as the petitioner mentioned, we would like to see some of these distributed more throughout the community. So the location where they're at, we could keep some there, but would like to see a couple more dispersed throughout so that they're closer to the front doors of all the units instead of just pushing them all over to the side. I think back and forth with this, through the PUD process, with our review, your review, and all the other departments' review, the location wasn't determined until later. And so when I was looking back through the review comments, our active transportation coordinator didn't get to see that until later. And he even made the comment on the PUD. But by that point, I think it had already been through the planning commission process. So he had brought the question up again of could we distribute these out a little bit more, having maybe two recs on the other side of the street or further closer to the entrance somewhere to just get better, closer access to some of the other units. So we are still asking for that. The proposed townhome elevations are consistent with the character imagery in the PUD. There are a minimum of four different designs for individual units. They have masonry along the full height of the first floor, and each building includes one unit with three floors of masonry on the front, and multiple units with two floors of masonry on the front. There are soundproofing requirements in the PUD to protect the units from the US 31 noise, and the petitioner has stated that they will meet these requirements. The petitioner did submit the black and white elevations since the department report has come out. I was on vacation last week, so I'm still reviewing those. They look like they're in line, but I'd like to take some time just to double check everything. I need to look at the roof slope and the overhang and the trim width and just the specifics of the PUD to make sure that they're meeting that. They are showing the tree preservation, which will be 0.81 acres for the site. And they are showing the buffer yard along the northern property line there. The detention basin will be planted with native vegetation seed mix around it. One entry sign is shown at the entrance to the subdivision. I believe, though, the orientation has changed a little since the packet. From what I saw from the latest submittal and project docs, it's now maybe a horizontal orientation. Can you confirm if you're going to be more vertical or horizontal? Because that's what brought up the comment about the distance, just to make sure it's set back from the right-of-way. But I just wanted the Planning Commission to see the design, if it would be more horizontal or vertical for the the 27 towns portion.

Yeah. So as we're rounding the corner to enter the neighborhood, we kind of have a slightly angled line for the right of way. So we will be offset from that. You see the column, which is the square and then faintly, I apologize that I can't zoom in here, but there is a line that goes in that northeasterly trajectory. That's where the blade sign would hang down. Um, and that's where you'd see the, the placard that hangs. So that would face at an angle out towards the intersection, more visible, for folks looking to find the subdivision.

Right. But if you have the, do you have the drawing that shows the 27 towns sign? This one?

Sorry.

Oh.

Oh, I didn't realize you couldn't see it.

I was like, it's not working. Yeah, that one. So I thought when you resubmitted now, it's more horizontal where it's 27 and it's longer instead of the vertical orientation.

Is that correct? Yeah, before the blade sign would be hanging more that direction. And then based on the redesign of the comment here, it's not going to be visible.

So at the same style, it's just going to be long 27 towns instead of 27 towns, if that makes sense. Yeah. I'm trying to find a picture before you. I don't know if you have that.

Oh, do you mean this?

The blade sign part. Yeah, that goes like that now. Because of the height, I think maybe.

Yeah, I think there was a... We have a sign very similar that we installed at our Meadowson community, which is kind of the southwest corner of 146 and Gray Road next to Salisbury. Very similar design that we're going to be using here. And so basically the engineer had designed with the same exact measurements as Meadowstone, same height, same everything, but then it was commented on after the submittal process that we needed to modify that in some way, shape, or form. So we basically just said modify it to comply if for whatever reason the previously built sign doesn't comply. We will agree to commit to work with the city and staff to build a compliance sign.

Thank you. And I'm comfortable with the new design. I just wanted to let the planning commission know it did change a little. But I think that was, again, like you said, to address the height because it was too tall before. And if we need to see that, I can pull it up for you later. So they've confirmed that it will be set back from the right-of-way, so that's great. And then I think another request that was made is they've added, or there is a mid-block crossing now so that somebody can cross the road and there's a ramp there, and so we're asking just to have that be striped as well so people are aware that there might be a crossing there. With that, so we'd still like to review the black line elevations. We still would request that the bike parking be more evenly distributed and add that mid-block striping. So we would recommend this go to the next committee meeting with the committee having the final voting authority. Thank you.

Great. Thank you very much. I will open it up to my fellow plan commissioners So I'll start with Adam.

Since it was a relevant topic towards the end there, the signage actually, it seems like the orientation prior was a little bit more visible. I mean, with it angled, I guess, northeast, there's only one way to enter the neighborhood, which is northbound on Illinois. I don't know how people are actually going to see that signage. So I would recommend finding a way that we can actually have it angled outwards towards Illinois, facing west.

Yeah, I'd be fine with whatever orientation. It was just a matter of complying with the height, I think, and it was, I don't know if it shrinks and stays in the vertical orientation, if it's, then the lettering is too small, if that's why it was changed, but they were just trying to move it so that it would be at least five feet from the right of way. Okay. For that blade sign part, I think. I can try to, I have it here if you want to see the new version. But yeah, I agree, as you're driving, the original location was probably easier to see. It's more as you're turning in now, you'll see the sign. . That's not where I went on vacation recently, but I wish I was. So here's the new design. OK, that's helpful to see.

So we didn't have that in our packet. I didn't see that.

Right, they had the original design, which was, again, a more vertical layout. Let's see if I can pull that over. I mean, similar style still, just, again, because of the height, I think they changed it to that horizontal.

Don't do too much.

This was the original. But it's seven feet tall. I think six feet is the maximum allowed.

To Adam's point, the way it's angled, is it visible on the road? Have you checked that, where you're placing it?

I tend to agree with that comment as well. I think the first thing we were trying to tackle was making sure that the base of the sign was in the correct location and then trying to resolve the the face of the sign, the part that's going to be hanging with the identification on it, we can make sure that it's aligned appropriately. I think part of, as I'm looking at the plan here, I think there's some mounding in that general location. So we didn't want to necessarily put the sign up kind of set into the mound. That wasn't going to necessarily satisfy the height requirements and such. So we can figure out a way to reorient the arm with the plaque that's going to be hanging. to make it appropriately facing. We'll continue to work with staff on that orientation in addition to the height.

That sounds good. That sounds good. Adam, since you were, I'll stay with you. Any other questions or comments? I'm sure I will. OK, any other questions, comments from up here for tonight? None? OK, then do I have a motion? Oh, wait, Debbie.

I don't even know if it's related. What's the Cushman Wakefield sign?

The one that's out there on the property today.

Thank you. I know what that is. But why is that there?

Because the landowner enlisted the assistance from Cushman Wakefield to sell the piece of property. OK. Just curious. So that's your marketing signage for people to know that it's available to the extent that they're not seeing it on the web.

Any other questions, comments? Seeing none, do I have a motion?

I move we send it to committee with the committee having final determination. Second.

Thank you. All those in favor of sending this docket to the committee with the committee having final voting authority, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Hearing none, we will see you at committee. Thank you very much. Up next is old business docket, and this is docket number PZ-2026-0049, DP Amendment 80-less, Stella House Books and Cafe Rebuild. The applicant seeks development plan amendment and design approval for the demolition of an existing building and rebuilding a new bookstore and coffee shop. The site is located at 31S Rangeland Road. It is zoned C2 mixed use. filed by Sean Curran of Curran Architecture on behalf of Stella House Books. So I will turn it over to the petitioner. So the floor is yours, Sean.

Thank you. Good evening. For the record, my name is Sean Curran with Curran Architecture Office at 5347 Lawton Loop East Drive in Indianapolis. and with me tonight are the owners of Stell House as well as our civil engineers, Schneider. We've seen the project a couple times now, our third time back, and I think that generally speaking, the commission has been supportive of kind of the overall building design and what we're proposing from that standpoint, and we're kind of down to some site-related items that came up in the previous two meetings. So I think that's kind of primarily the focus of our meeting tonight. I do want to turn it over to Miranda with Stella House to kind of introduce things on her end, and then we'll turn it over to the civil engineers. Thank you.

Hello. Like Sean said, my name is Miranda Armey, co-owner of Stella House Books. located at 31 South Range Line, the project we are discussing today. Thank you again for the opportunity for us to bring our project to the commission and work out the details. I would like to open with perhaps a non-traditional presentation with a brief overview of the history of our project and our work since we were last together before introducing Mike Wiley and Elaine Coulter, our civil engineers, to present the details of the plan. I hope this gives us perspective as we move forward in presenting our plan for approval by the commission today. As we have stated in previous meetings, Stella House Books and Cafe is a dream of ours, my husband and I, that we can't wait to bring to Carmel. And we originally fell in love with the Dutch Revival home built in 1903, fully intending to put the bookstore inside the home while also expanding out the back for the cafe. Stella House is the house on 31 South Range Line. It's the dream. It's the brand. It all took shape because of the inspiration of this home and the way that it sits in downtown Carmel. As you may remember, though, in the fall of last year, after months of planning, we did receive city approval to move forward with our plan for renovation and expansion. However, in the early phases, we uncovered some significant structural issues that could not be overcome, however much we tried. And at that time, we still decided to remain committed to our original goal of bringing this home back to life and decided to persevere. If we couldn't save the original structure, though, we committed to rebuilding to save the historical character of the house in downtown Carmel in both architecture and place on the site that it sat for 123 years. We submitted near identical plans to the city as we're first approved, expecting an easy process since we had already been approved on these plans months prior. And now we are back together for our third time with the commission and hope that we can appeal to commission to continue to help us move forward. So we can finally bring this project to life. Last time we were here, we presented on how we address the commission's concerns related to the look of the south side of the building. We also presented the extensive ADA ramp that we designed that will allow access from range line for all of our guests and the community, regardless of ability. However, we did not receive approval and were tasked with working through comments with the city planners and engineering about requiring an eight foot sidewalk and street parking along range line. In talking with my civil engineering team, We could not see how to achieve both of those requests while also maintaining the large tree and without significantly changing the look of our property. We held a meeting on site with city planners and a representative from engineering department with the objective of showing our concerns and challenges of our site as it relates to the very steep grade, the importance of maintaining our tree, and hopefully to further emphasize that the historic character of this place was extremely important to us. Our team did receive formal feedback from the city that Monday that street parking could be taken off the project if we put an eight-foot sidewalk, proved ADA compliance that tied in with the city's plans for our lot and our neighbors, and afford the work on our neighbor's property to ensure ADA compliance to be done at the same time with reimbursement for construction costs as necessary. And as an additional footnote, we were now being requested to include a city lamp post. After much planning and discussion and consideration, we still felt that it was very important to maintain the historic properties of our site, the tree, the way the house sits on the hill, the way we connect with our neighbors, et cetera. In addition, there were other real constraints of our site, like we've talked about, the steep grade, that with the eight-foot sidewalk, we would not only lose our mature tree, that there was no space to put other street trees, and we would have a steep drop-off from the sidewalk to the street, posing a safety concern. Our team met and submitted a response last week. These plans maintain the sidewalk at the current grade and current width to mitigate the site constraints, save the tree and historic character of the property while also still providing ADA accessibility and compliance. Because the lamppost was newly added as a new request at the time, we did not plan to include that request as financed by our project, but we're happy to make room on our site. And finally, did not want to take responsibility the planning or the work to improve the sidewalk of our neighbors to the south even with reimbursement for construction costs this does not assume reimbursement for the additional civil engineering costs engineering responded on monday the city responded that they now require a six foot sidewalk and they still require the lamppost and the assumption of planning and construction of our neighbors sidewalk as it relates to the ADA requirements, are incurring costs that we were not originally prepared for, while also still significantly impacting the vision of our project. With all that being said, as background, we are here tonight to appeal to the Commission, as citizens but also small business owners, we are not a large corporate entity, but a husband and wife team trying to create something beautiful for our community and revitalize a block in downtown Carmel that has long deteriorated. We have followed the process for city approval in good faith that we would be met with not only support, but hopefully even excitement for our project since we will be bringing retail and vibrancy to an area of downtown Carmel currently dormant. However, throughout this process, we have been met with continually moving goalposts and asks to achieve the city's plan for street and sidewalk improvements. We appreciate the goals of the city and are willing to commit to continue working on these issues of the lamppost and the work to be done on our neighbor's property relating to ADA compliance. However, I'd like to introduce our civil engineers to discuss the details of our plan that asks the commission to diverge from the expansion of the sidewalk as recommended by criminal engineering.

Good evening, Mike Wiley, Schneider Geomatics, office location 8901 Otis Avenue in Indianapolis. Tonight, just to add into what Miranda was talking about with the site, we do have several challenges that we've been trying to look at from an engineering and landscape architecture standpoint with trying to maintain the character of the lot itself as it exists today. I'm not sure if we can get the aerial, the picture camera going. This is just a view of the development of the site. As Miranda spoke, we've worked through the handicap access off of Range Line, which was a request of staff. That ADA access extends to the back of the property, comes adjacent to the parking stalls, and enters through the back of the building. One of the items that staff had asked to meet was a 60% coverage with our ADA access doors. Since the last plan, It is proposed to add an additional door here to the building. And then on the range line roadside, which is page left, the yellow circle is a very large mature tree that you heard Miranda speaking to. We'll skip the boring black and white page. This image really tells the story of what we're discussing. The left image with the blue, that is the existing sidewalk. And what we're proposing to do is to maintain the grade change from the facility to the sidewalk and then the grade change from the sidewalk to the curb line of range line is keep that intact with the characteristics of the house and the site. We're able to achieve that with a four and a half foot walk, which is the existing walk. That saves the very mature tree that you see in this location. And we also have a fiber optic line that's highlighted here with the yellow that extends down range line. And there's actually, on the opposite side of the tree, there's a pull box. So that becomes an additional obstacle to us. So with those considerations, the conversations with staff has been to add what you see as far as the additional sidewalk here in width. You can see the implications of that. It does go right through the middle of the very mature tree. But it also encompasses the fiber optic line. And with that, obviously, it would be a tree removal. and then relocation of the fiber optic line and pull boxes itself. And there are some concerns with the green space that's left in this location that once we relocate the fiber line, the only place for that to go is in the green space adjacent to the curb line of range line, thereby eliminating street trees, things of that nature, because we have a fiber optic system in the way. There are several things we've really looked at in talking with staff. There again, with the infamous emphasis of trying to maintain the character. There are some conflicting things with ordinances. A landscape ordinance requires an 8-foot strip for planting street trees. You can see with the right image, we would not meet that. And also, there are some characteristics in the overlay that require to save trees, and obviously that's what we're trying to attempt to do here. Here are just some images just to further clarify things from the previous meeting and things that have been accomplished. You can see the proposed conditions of the development. This is the alley adjacent to our site, so the north side. The ADA access coming from range line here to the south will come up the ramp to the rear of the property. Some additional images here just so you can see what is planned and how we're really trying to maintain the character. of the site itself with the structure. And I'll flip through these quickly because I do have one other item I do want to discuss. So going back to the exhibit of the street, one of the things is the green space that would be left with the larger sidewalk. The green space I'm referring to is right in here. Not that that would be limited to five feet. I mentioned, obviously, we would not be able to meet the ordinance for the green space width in the street trees conflicting with the fiber optic line. But it's the grade change that happens here also. You can see the hill in transition as we come off of the existing home. With our project, we've actually lowered the building approximately a foot to try to help. The site has intricacies as far as grades. You can see the transition in the front. The grade on the parking side, which is the rear of the cafe, is the highest point on the site. So the idea of trying to strip the site flat would obviously pose several different challenges, causes for retaining walls, things of that nature. And that's actually part of what a solution would be up front for that grade transition. The green space that you see here, if the wider sidewalk was put in, we would exceed a four-to-one slope off of that sidewalk. A couple of concerns with that are, one, it's a steep slope. How are we going to maintain that? But even more important is the safety of pedestrians on the sidewalk. If someone was to slide down the embankment, they would end up in Range Line Road. So the only alternative is a small retaining wall along the frontage. I don't think the character of that fits what everybody's looking for here. Did I miss anything? We tag-teamed this, so I just wanted to make sure. I'd be glad to answer any questions. And I think Rand did a good job of the outstanding items and really it has come back down to the ask, obviously with the street light being added and the adjacent property to the south. And maybe just one clarification for the commission is the property to the south is not ADA compliant. So this was brought to our attention. As you proceed south, our south adjoiner at the next intersection has steps. So the solution is, in working with staff, is They have an ADA plan on plan, but they have not executed it yet for this property. That's what the ask is that Miranda was referring to, is correcting the existing condition to make it ADA accessible for going to the south. Thank you.

Thank you very much. If there's no other comments from the petitioner, I'll turn it over to staff for your comments.

Thank you. For the record, again, Alexia Lopez with Department of Community Services. As Petitioner has shown, they have made changes to the site plan to accommodate more ADA accessibility from Rangeline Road into the site, into the rear entrance. And then the stairway from Rangeline Road was removed, and now there's that sloped sidewalk that goes all along kind of the alley to get to the entrance in the back. Also, Petitioner did meet with planning staff, engineering staff, our ADA coordinator on site to discuss the requested changes. And there is an interesting grade change there, especially when the site is already up higher, and then you get to the sidewalk, and then there's a grade change from the sidewalk to the street. So that's a pretty big grade change as well. So after looking at all that and discussing it, I think the engineering department was comfortable with foregoing the on-street parking today, which would normally be required along Main Street, as you've seen some of those new projects. We like to get the on-street parking along Rangeline Road. And instead, they were requesting originally, I think, an eight-foot sidewalk to go. And then ideally, we'd go all along that frontage and make the south property sidewalk ADA compliant as well, because now there's steps right there. So one property is to the south. You have to go down the steps. And then you would get to the new development with a 1933 lounge. So that was kind of, I think, a compromise engineering was willing to make instead of doing the on-street parking. And that's a general request for any project is we look at the comprehensive plan and the transportation plan, and the UDO says whatever is on the transportation plan, that's what we would expect a new development to build and install. So I think then since having some of those conversations and emails back and forth with the engineering department, engineering was comfortable maybe now with a, or I was Wondering if we could do a six foot sidewalk instead. I think that was maybe a suggestion. So we're waiting, I was waiting on the revised design to see if that would work and how that slope would be with the tree lawn and getting down to the street level from there. I did speak with engineering and I think we are in discussions with the petitioner and we're working together and we've met on site so they were comfortable with approving it this evening and being able to work out those final details after. We're thankful that the petitioner met with us on site I'm trying to see if there's any other updates. I think that was it. I mean, the main ones that we had talked about at the last meeting were the ADA accessibility and then the on-street parking and the street right-of-way cross-section. So we would recommend approval tonight with the condition on final comments being addressed through Project OCS.

Thank you. Thank you very much. Before I turn it over to questions and comments from everybody, I have one quick question to clarify. Is the engineering department asking them to make changes on their neighbor's property?

I think what engineering was saying is the way I understood it is if they were going to widen the sidewalk and making that ADA compliant, they wanted to make sure, one, that it would connect to the existing sidewalk and be ADA compliant. And if there was going to be grade change or something was going to happen to where the new sidewalk in front of Stella wouldn't now match up or wouldn't be able to be ADA compliant with this property to the south, Then they were saying, well, let's just do it all together. And I think they had talked about reimbursing them for the costs of that for the south property in that right-of-way, but just building it all at once.

So the ask from engineering is to take it from their property all the way to 1933 Lounge? One property south, yeah. So I'll just say from my experience sitting here on the plan commission, I don't think we've ever asked a petitioner to refund the cost of improvements outside their parcel. So it seems like usually it's just on there. I've never seen that. It seems like a bit of an unfair ask, I would say. But I will open it up to my fellow plan commissioners for your questions and comments.

I don't think we can request it legally. This is not, and I apologize, I missed that from an engineering perspective. I have not had a chance to speak with them. I don't think it would be a reasonable request to require an ADA compliance on a adjoining property. It is not a requirement under UDO. It certainly is not a requirement in the state code. And that request would be unreasonable. Again, I apologize. I didn't catch it before. No, thank you for clarifying that. I would have brought it to your attention, but I don't know how legally we can require a petitioner to improve property down the road.

OK, thank you, because that was my sense. But I'm glad to have legal validation of that sense.

Their email did say that they were going to be able to reimburse the reasonable cost of constructing those improvements.

So I don't think they were asking them to pay for all that. But if they're going to be building it today, anyway, it was- But it would be reasonable cost of improvements only on their property, not- On the South property. See, I think that's where we're saying it's not a fair ask, not a legal ask. To go beyond your property.

It's not like they were asking you to pay for everything. They were just saying, hey, you're going to build this. Let's make sure it's all ADA compliant. Can you build on the south as well? And we'll reimburse you for those costs on the south. That's not your property.

Before I start asking more questions, I will open up the rest of you. Adam?

Yeah, I guess as I'm looking at the site, maybe these are outdated images, but along these lines of the walking path. There's a lot of utilities too. So is it technically an alleyway on the northern portion of their property? Is there a name for that road? No, it's just an alley. Do we know if the utility lines on that alley are being planned to be put underground? There's also a utility line, a long range line road that's on their property. Will that cause delays? Is this all coming down eventually? I'm just curious. I don't know if that's going to really screw up the plans for how this project moves forward or not, kind of at the mercy of the utility companies.

Yeah, I think they've been looking into that and where the utilities are. And I thought the last thing I saw, there was a pole along the alley, but I didn't see that it would be impacted by the sidewalk. But I don't know if they've had conversations with utilities about moving that.

Duke or? Yes. Once again, Mike Wiley, let me find an image here real quick.

There we go. OK. So there's two overhead lines. This one will be removed because it is just connecting service to the building back here that's going to be removed. Could you get closer to the mic so that everybody at home who's watching this can hear you too? There is an existing poll. Oh, yes.

And could you please state your name for the record?

Elaine Coulter. I'm sorry. Thank you very much. The pole that is located a little bit further to the east, this one will be removed. It's just providing service to the building back here. So yes, this overhead line will remain, but we have designed our project to accommodate for it. If it goes underground, that would be wonderful. That gives us some more space, but we have accommodated space for that existing pole.

So I guess my comment would be I'd hate to see a scenario where they move forward with the plans as approved, and then all of a sudden they have to come back and rip up the sidewalk again to bury the lines. That would be kind of pointless. In addition, there's also a utility line on range line that I'm curious about.

Was that discussed at all in your topics? Yeah, that's the fiber optic line. That's the fiber line, okay. And the utilities going down the north side of the site are in the alley. That's inclusive of electric. That just services things that are going east-west. The proposed line, we're setting a transformer on the rear of the property. We have opened communications with Duke about, hey, what would it take to bury this here, both from an aesthetic standpoint of the cafe, but really this line that you see on our property here that crosses Rangeland Road to the west. That's really one of the only aerial lines that are in that area. So we're trying to talk to them what would it take to do this. And we have reached out to the right of way, contacted Caleb, and started that dialogue with him also.

I would also like to clarify, just on the sidewalk ask, We were sent the city's plans for bringing the south end of that sidewalk into ADA compliance. And we are matching our plan, our sidewalk plan, with the city's existing plan. So our stretch of sidewalk is designed to match the existing grade that Carmel is proposing in their plans to make the south end ADA compliant.

Just to add to what Elaine's saying, and I'll shift this a little bit farther this way. We did receive the plans from the city of what they were looking at for ADA accessibility, not just for the Jason property, but this has roughly 20 properties going south. Obviously, there have been various developments that have happened there along the way. But to Elaine's point, their plan was to basically have a retained ramp because this does have the challenges, same as we do, but yet to be determined in what are the conflicts with the steps that go into that adjoining properties front entrance. There's a lot of transition in the grade that still happens here that we're referring to on the north. And if I may, I just wanted to correct myself on this image. If we could zoom in. The pink that I was referring to, the outer limits was the original ask of eight foot wide. The lines that you see here, this is the impact of a six-foot sidewalk. You can see even with the six-foot sidewalk, we still have the same challenges. It just puts the fiber right on the edge of the new six-foot walk. But the tree, and I believe the city had an arborist come out and discuss not disturbing the roots of that tree. They can't take anything more without destroying that tree. That would put the edge of the six-foot walk right in the edge of the tree.

Thank you for that explanation. In addition to the wires, I would not like to see that tree removed. I'd like to see that stay there.

I absolutely 100% agree with you. Thank you, counselors. I would really hate to see that tree be removed.

Yeah, no, thank you.

Jeff. I guess I've got maybe a question for this group or the petitioner. It's more of a broad thought. I get the notion we should try to save the tree. The tree looks great. The wider sidewalk impacts that. The grade is a challenge. But then I look at the, I'll say the redevelopments happened to the north, the 1933 project to the south. Those have developed a curb and then right behind it, I'll say a regular ADA compliant slope is a much wider sidewalk. And so is that our vision for here someday down the road? And so do we need to, you know, say bite the bullet now and make something like that happen? Do we somehow mitigate now and that never happens? I guess I'm just asking out loud to think what the commission feels is the temperature on that topic. I guess the other thing I think of is, is there an avenue where we can leave it alone today? Is there some payment in lieu of that could help set aside budget for doing this someday, maybe when the property to the south develops? I don't know if that's been discussed, and then does that properly account for, you know, grading and retaining walls and trees and the sidewalk and all that kind of thing?

Well, we do have that in our VDO where you can pay into the transportation fund instead of making the improvements yourself for such an occasion as this. Now, obviously, based on what I'm hearing, it sounds like our engineering department and our petition are pretty wide apart on what would be included in that, but I'm sure that's something that could be negotiated. Go ahead.

According to the city's Old Town overlay map, this house is actually considered a character building. So preserving the historical presence of the house is really important, not just to the petitioner, but also to Carmel's ordinances as well. But that whole block there has a lot of significance historically that we are trying to hold on to. And it it does not fit into the character of the blocks north and south, not just from an aesthetic standpoint, but also from a topography standpoint as well. There's a lot of challenges on our site topographically that the north and the south do not have to address.

And if I may add, I appreciate you bringing that up, Jeff, about the future plans, because that is something that we would be requesting, I guess, at this time to work work with the commission, with staff, to find an avenue to basically allow this to be one and done. For us to keep this historical, as Elaine mentioned, character of our block. And also, and I think we spoke about this perhaps last meeting, or maybe it was at the meeting we had on site, that yellow house to our south is also of kind of a historical nature. It is older than our house. I believe 18... 90 or so. It's rumored to be a part of the Underground Railroad. I don't see our lot, including our south neighbor, being developed in the same way as the 1933 Lounge Building, the lower building, and our neighbor to the north. I believe that by maintaining this part of Old Town, that we're preserving a unique piece of downtown Carmel, and it should be treated in a unique way. And I'd like kind of help to determine how to preserve that.

Thank you. I think that's a good point.

Adam? I guess I just agree with Jeff. I mean, there's definitely, it appears to be a vision for the sidewalk improvements north and south eventually. It just doesn't seem like we're there now. And I hate to a small business owner i mean it seems wrong to put a small business owner on the hook for a lot of these improvements when there's not really a clear vision for what the future looks like i i agree with that um and oh mike yes director hollible i agree too but um i mean i i think um i mean these are tough i mean infill projects are always going to be tough um

I think Commissioner Hill's comment about that vision is absolutely correct, and I do think that's what the engineering department is trying to achieve. Realizing this is a small project and to burden the petitioner with all those improvements certainly challenges the project, and it just makes it hard to do implementation in the short term. And to the to the comments about the character building. I mean, we certainly recognize that it's a significant old home that's coming down, but when the city rezoned that to C2, it removed those overlay provisions. And so even though we recognize that it's a character building, the long-term goal was that that property was going to change. And we do think that the As you kind of march down south along Range Line, those properties are going to redevelop. And so that sidewalk improvement that you see in front of 1933, I think, is what we would like to see, at least along that stretch, as far as we can get it. I do think that DOCS and engineering and the petitioner can work something out now that at least as an incremental improvement. I don't know what that looks like, but I also think that we as a city need to come to grips with addressing the AD issues, ADA issues, all along that stretch of range line, whether or not it's the full compliance, which probably isn't going to happen, but we do have transportation plan, long-term plan, We have development standards, and we can't just make things up. It'll all be negotiated.

So I'm going to turn to the petitioner. I think this is a fantastic project. I also don't want to see the engineering cost be something that breaks, yeah, makes it not possible. Do you, your sense, do you think you can work with the city to come up with something that is feasible, that is workable? on the transportation plan piece of it for your site only? We're not going to go beyond your site.

The answer is yes. We have been trying to work with the city on a comprehensive future plan for this stretch. I think the biggest issue that we've run into is it because it's so different topographically that nobody really has been able to give us an answer on what exactly the city's plans are for that strip. And we reviewed the thoroughfare plan. We acknowledged that our boulevard status was going to require street parking, but we're also really constrained by the grade changes. If street parking were to go on there, that sidewalk would have to drop down to street level, which is several feet. In order to do that, you would have to have a retaining wall along the entire property. For me, the only way I would see that you would be able to get this consistent look from what you're looking at with the 1933 building and the building to our north is literally to completely demolish that whole block, which would take away the historical significance of this property. And the community has really shown an interest in keeping this property the way it is. When we were out on site last week, Somebody stopped in their car and said, please don't change this building. The community likes it the way it is. And we are doing our best to maintain the existing character of the building while making it safe, while making it usable. And if we significantly change the grade of this sidewalk along rangeline in the future, it's going to impact our ADA access from the rangeline sidewalk. We have almost six feet of elevation change from the sidewalk to the back of the property. And it took a lot of tailoring to be able to get that ramp to work. along the north side of our property all the way to the back and not just make it ADA compliant but making it pretty and making it inclusive. Like we aren't sending somebody in a wheelchair to the back of the building. The back of the building is a main entrance just as much as the entrance here with the steps. We want this to feel like a space where everyone is involved, everybody is welcome, and If we change the range line sidewalk significantly, it's going to significantly impact that for this property.

Thank you. Any other questions, comments? Debbie.

I just want to be clear. You're working with a utility provider for the above ground line to see if at the same time you're doing all of this work, they intend to bury it. That will happen or it won't, but you're at least working with the proper authorities to do that. The sidewalk, the city will work with you to come up with a way to get the sidewalk in within the boundaries of your property, and if the city wants any more extension of that, it will be at the city's cost, and they will work with you, and you will work with them on how that gets accomplished. I know I'm sounding elementary, but... For the benefit of people watching, I think it's helpful sometimes to just boil it down to what we're talking about.

Absolutely. And I think our biggest ask is not that we don't want to work with Carmel, but we need a clear vision from Carmel as well, because the plans that we were provided for the ADA compliance on the sidewalk south, it still shows a four and a half foot walk. So we were complying with what Carmel provided us as their future plans, so what we would ask of the city is that please let us know how you intend to make this strip tie into the existing because we would much rather design that now on our site because however you change this, it's going to affect our site. And it's not that we are not willing to work with that. We just need to know what we're working with so we can comply with it and still make it aesthetically pleasing and still keep the character of the building.

Okay, so... So, you know, this is a really outstanding project, and it's a unique parcel, and it's a unique character. I... Councillor Ayers and I don't want to see that tree go away, but it also sounds like... And what?

It feels like we're kind of delaying the inevitable, unfortunately.

Well, so... What I'm looking for is a suggestion for a motion, which I would suggest a motion to approve with the petitioner working with the engineering or DOCS staff to resolve this, I guess, transportation issue. But before we do that, I would like to hear more if that is satisfactory. Or does anybody have a different? I'm concerned about... if engineering is going to drag this on for a while, is this something that they're going to be able to come to a resolution quickly?

I would think so. I think my idea for next step would be we vote on this tonight, and then we met with them on site, which was helpful to see how everything was on site, but we didn't have the plans in front of us on a table where we could all look around and draw, so I think maybe the next step would be have another meeting. Because since then, it's just been back and forth through email. So it's like, can you do this? And then it's like, OK, we tried to do this. And so sometimes email is not always the best way to get, I think, to the final resolution. So now that we've gotten some more design details, maybe we meet again with engineering and say, OK, here's where we're at. What can we do now? And hopefully get to a resolution.

Jonathan. My only concern about voting on it tonight And putting it back in staff's hands is one. I think it's somewhat unfair to planning staff to have to go back and carry that message to engineering. And if engineering draws a hard line in the sand and says, nope, this is the way it has to be, what does that do to Petitioner's project? That's my only concern. I don't want to see the tree go. I think this is a great project. But I also think they're coming to us and asking us for help. And I think we have some level of obligation to provide that help. There's obviously differences of opinion on how the site gets developed or how the sidewalk gets adjusted. I always appreciate Alexia and the staff's perspectives and recommendations. I just don't want us to get caught where we send this back to staff, say, hey, work it out, and then they come back in a month and say, hey, we didn't work it out.

So are you proposing just a motion to approve?

I don't know what I'm proposing yet. Madam Chairman. I'm just trying to get some thoughts out there.

So my question is, what I'm hearing is, the consensus of what I'm hearing is, we would like to approve this tonight, subject to petitioner and city officials working out all of the final details regarding the sidewalk landscaping transportation orientation. Well, I think that's just the opposite of what Jonathan was saying. Well, no. I'm hearing the consensus that we would like to see that, but we want, so the second part of that is within a reasonable period of time. So my question to the counselor is, if we approved it tonight, subject to everybody coming to a kumbaya moment and agreeing on things, can we put a time frame on that, at which point it would automatically either come back to the commission or some other thing?

you're probably better off sending it to committee or holding it for a month. But I think if they're willing to go back to committee, that gives us a couple of weeks to them and us to work something out with Brad and his team.

Well, so to Jonathan's point, we want to help you. So committee would be in two weeks, I think. I really, I know this has been dragging on, and I don't want to make you have to go back to another committee if you don't want to, but if you feel like you're up for that.

I think we are as a team. We discuss that as a possibility, and I think the benefit to coming to commissioning committee is it holds us all to a timeline, too, so we can have a discussion and then bring more solutions. I think we're comfortable with that as a team.

Okay, well then... I'll need a motion to send this to committee with final voting authority.

I'll make a motion to send this to committee with final voting authority. Second.

Thank you very much for the motion. The second. All those in favor of sending this to the committee with final voting authority, please say aye. Aye. We'll see you in just a couple weeks. So thank you for your patience. Thank you for continuing to work with the city. We really appreciate it. Thank you. That is our last item on the agenda. We are adjourned.

Oh, me too. The tree's coming down now. I mean, I was the one who put my neck out there to say that on the notes, but it's coming down. It's coming down. All right, take us off live. Hey, Mike, Alexia.

Thank you, guys.

Towards that goal.